Hilariously bad retrospective. No understanding of the Seahawks needs at the time and how Pete Carroll builds teams. How does an ILB and TE build a franchise?

Other than the fact that there is no way anyone in their right mind would trade Okung for Gronk at this point, I am certain that we would not have passed on Eric Berry at the 14th overall pick if he were available - even now. Safeties hang around a long time. LBs should basically never be taken in the first round (save 3-4 rush ends).

At least the guy admits Thomas was much more elite than Berry, but while he says he's re-doing based upon need, he absolutely underestimates the Seahawks critical NEED to have a LT. Our O-line was in shambles and Carroll knew what he was doing when he addressed it in his first two drafts.

Richard Sherman doesn't just wanna get in your head, he wants to build a vacation home there.

pretty dumb but as stated there's not much of a point to these, just writers trying to justify their offseason paychecks.

Okung and Thomas are great. As much as I'd love gronk in a hawks uniform I wouldn't trade either for him.

The pick of a LB is nonsense, I've never been high on LB's in a draft, though I was admittedly tricked into being happy about the curry pick. I've just been always convinced a good defense starts with a good secondary that takes away your passing game, and then a good line that can stop the run. LB's to me should compensate for deficiencies in either group. Hence why I'm hoping we pick up Chase Thomas in RD 3-5 at some point. He's not going to blow anyone a way with his measurables but he's smart and can help either group out.

Why would anyone trade Okung for Gronkowski? That just doesn't make sense. I don't think any team would do that, especially after a few years of both playing. Okung is a very good LT. You could argue he's one of the best in the game right now. Those are hard to find, they go in the top half of the first round for a reason. No serious NFL coach or GM would EVER value a TE over a LT that plays the way Okung does. Well, maybe Al Davis or Jerry Jones would, or maybe Tim Ruskell, but no intelligent winning coach or GM would ever consider that trade.

I guarantee if you offered Okung to NE on a trade, they'd give you Gronk AND a couple high picks. Just shows these writers generally know less about the game than casual fans.

Gronkowski is great, but seem to be hurt too much, and that's too high to take any TE anyway. As important as LT is, the only guys still on the board at #6 that I think you could come up with any argument to take ahead of Okung are Geno Atkins and Jason-Pierre Paul.

Sorry but ill take Gronk over Okung. He is the best TE in the NFL and its not even close. I like Okung a lot, and it would be ashame to just miss out on him with our second first rounder, but Gronk has generational talent. Can't be a homer on this one

Two monumenta 1st roundl hits to start your franchise rebuild with a new regime. You can't ask for more. But we got more, by getting Kam so late. What a great Draft. How cool would it have been to get Gronk in the 2nd though?

Anyone want to make me a new signature? I've held out hope long enough.95% of the time I'm viewing here and/or posting is being done on a mobile device. Pardon any spelling, punctuation, or grammar mistakes.

Missing_Clink wrote:Sorry but ill take Gronk over Okung. He is the best TE in the NFL and its not even close. I like Okung a lot, and it would be ashame to just miss out on him with our second first rounder, but Gronk has generational talent. Can't be a homer on this one

No he isn't. He has Tom Brady. Is he better than Whitten? To put him on par with the original Kellen Winslow? Dude is the modern day Todd Christensen. Sans Jerry curl mullet.

Missing_Clink wrote:Sorry but ill take Gronk over Okung. He is the best TE in the NFL and its not even close. I like Okung a lot, and it would be ashame to just miss out on him with our second first rounder, but Gronk has generational talent. Can't be a homer on this one

Homer? If you can't keep your QB upright or healthy long enough to throw to guys like Gronk, what's the point? I think you're putting the chicken before the egg here. Yeah, let's get a TE when our OL's in shambles..that'll fix everything. I'm mean the table was set, right? All we needed was TE to put us over the top OL players are over valued anyhow. Are you any relation to Timmaaay Ruskell?

Missing_Clink wrote:Sorry but ill take Gronk over Okung. He is the best TE in the NFL and its not even close. I like Okung a lot, and it would be ashame to just miss out on him with our second first rounder, but Gronk has generational talent. Can't be a homer on this one

Homer? If you can't keep your QB upright or healthy long enough to throw to guys like Gronk, what's the point? I think you're putting the chicken before the egg here. Yeah, let's get a TE when our OL's in shambles..that'll fix everything. I'm mean the table was set, right? All we needed was TE to put us over the top OL players are over valued anyhow. Are you any relation to Timmaaay Ruskell?

Guarantee I saw the writing on the wall about Timmay before 95% of the posters on here. Anyways, like I said, I like Okung a lot, but I think Gronk is on another level as a weapon in the offense. The Cards needed a LT too when they took Levi Brown. Think they might rather have Adrian Peterson? I'm taking the more talented player between the two. That's all. Nothing personal against Okung (who was the player I most wanted in the draft that year by the way)

KCHawkGirl wrote:These things are always interesting to look at but ultimately make no sense much like power rankings.

I agree. It's just something to do in the off season when there isn't any football going on. Hindsight is always 20/20. The real key for great coaches is to have that 20/20 *foresight*.

I think there are lessons to be learned for the future from hindsight, such as: what are the characteristics of players that ultimately became higher-quality starters than projected based on what round they were taken?

Pete and John have already shown great--not omniscient, but uncanny--ability to spot "functional" talent and work ethic. I would bet they learn from the draft picks that didn't work out as well as those that have.

TE that gets the ball 1 in 5 plays versus a Left Tackle that protects the QB and opens holes every play, I take LT every day, I suppose you could go back to the Jones and Springs draft which is reasonable close and justify a pass on Jones for Gonzalez also.

To Be P/C or Not P/C That is the Question..........Seahawks kick Ass !!!! Check your PM's, Thank you for everything Radish RIP My Friend. Member of the 38 club.

Missing_Clink wrote:Sorry but ill take Gronk over Okung. He is the best TE in the NFL and its not even close. I like Okung a lot, and it would be ashame to just miss out on him with our second first rounder, but Gronk has generational talent. Can't be a homer on this one

Homer? If you can't keep your QB upright or healthy long enough to throw to guys like Gronk, what's the point? I think you're putting the chicken before the egg here. Yeah, let's get a TE when our OL's in shambles..that'll fix everything. I'm mean the table was set, right? All we needed was TE to put us over the top OL players are over valued anyhow. Are you any relation to Timmaaay Ruskell?

Guarantee I saw the writing on the wall about Timmay before 95% of the posters on here. Anyways, like I said, I like Okung a lot, but I think Gronk is on another level as a weapon in the offense. The Cards needed a LT too when they took Levi Brown. Think they might rather have Adrian Peterson? I'm taking the more talented player between the two. That's all. Nothing personal against Okung (who was the player I most wanted in the draft that year by the way)

Ditto with seeing Timmy for who he was and there's a few here that will back me up (Dr. Diags, kearly, etc.). As for Gronk v. Okung I'm with the other folks here disagreeing with you. I go with Russ cuz it's a far more important position than TE.

HansGruber wrote:Why would anyone trade Okung for Gronkowski? That just doesn't make sense. I don't think any team would do that, especially after a few years of both playing. Okung is a very good LT. You could argue he's one of the best in the game right now. Those are hard to find, they go in the top half of the first round for a reason. No serious NFL coach or GM would EVER value a TE over a LT that plays the way Okung does. Well, maybe Al Davis or Jerry Jones would, or maybe Tim Ruskell, but no intelligent winning coach or GM would ever consider that trade.

I guarantee if you offered Okung to NE on a trade, they'd give you Gronk AND a couple high picks. Just shows these writers generally know less about the game than casual fans.

I don't agree with that.

First off Gronk shouldn't be looked at as a TE because he's a 1000 yard a season 10+ TD receiver essentially, and WRs are valued almost as highly as LTs.

Look at the 2007 draft, Calvin Johnson 2nd, Joe Thomas 3rd.Gronk is just about as valuable as Megatron IMO, if not moreso. He may not get as many yards, but 38 TDs in 43 games is an otherworldly rate.

That said, Seattle didn't just have any old need for an LT, it was arguably the weakest position on the team with Ray Willis and Sean Locklear our starting tackles in 2009, so there's no way we'd have picked Gronkowski at 6 unless we were sure either Trent Williams or Okung fell to us at 14th (or we were prepared to trade up, swap that 4th round pick we spent on EJ Manuel to move up 2 picks?)

KCHawkGirl wrote:These things are always interesting to look at but ultimately make no sense much like power rankings.

I agree. It's just something to do in the off season when there isn't any football going on. Hindsight is always 20/20. The real key for great coaches is to have that 20/20 *foresight*.

I think there are lessons to be learned for the future from hindsight, such as: what are the characteristics of players that ultimately became higher-quality starters than projected based on what round they were taken?

Pete and John have already shown great--not omniscient, but uncanny--ability to spot "functional" talent and work ethic. I would bet they learn from the draft picks that didn't work out as well as those that have.

Experience is a big factor in *foresight* I do agree.

But a bigger predictor in my opinion is a coach's knowledge of the game. (of which experience is a subset of said knowledge) So when I say knowledge, I mean all the little tricks of the trade, the ability to grasp the nuances of half time adjustments and the like.

The final part of doing well is simply who you know. So - on top of *what* a coach knows, also an important aspect of getting info on a draft pick (for example) is *who* you know. I.e. do you know the coach's RB coach that can give you a better idea of the RB situation, or perhaps the offensive coordinator who actually worked with the QB you are thinking of drafting. etc...

Missing_Clink wrote:Sorry but ill take Gronk over Okung. He is the best TE in the NFL and its not even close. I like Okung a lot, and it would be ashame to just miss out on him with our second first rounder, but Gronk has generational talent. Can't be a homer on this one

Value... A LT is significantly more valuable than a TE. What was the last great team with a crappy LT?

I look at this as just a couple of writers having fun. It's a slow time and this is just something fun to do. Alternate history is always intriguing. Gronk is good and all, but if he had come here then, no one would know who he is. We had nobody to get him the ball. Having Tom Brady throw it to you is the best situation you could possibly be in. I don't know, I like these little hypotheticals. Just meant to be a little bit of fun before the draft.

seatt1eslew wrote:Silver lining: Thomas and Okung went 5 and 13 in the redraft. So in the writer's mind, the Hawks won the real draft (the one that actually counts).

Go Hawks

No kidding. Having actually picked at 6 and 14 the same players that the writer picked at 5 and 13 in the redraft with the full benefit of hindsight isn't too shabby.

Not to mention Kam going #24 in this "re-draft" -- a whopping 109 picks before he was actually drafted!

You've got to be willing to go against the tide. You've got to be be willing to harness your will and say In spite of this I'm in control here! I'm coming back and I'll be stronger and better because of it!- Les Brown